Vandals desecrate Jewish cemetery in Warwick

WARWICK - A Jewish cemetery in the Town of Warwick has been brutally vandalized with anti-Semitic graffiti, just days before Yom Kippur, the holiest day of the Jewish year.

Members of Temple Beth Shalom, whose 70-year-old synagogue is in the Village of Florida, are heartbroken over the large black swastikas they found spray-painted across the low stone wall that forms the front boundary of the cemetery.

The vandals also scrawled the words “Heil Hitler” and the letters “SS,” for the Nazi Schutzstaffel, or military police.

Temple President Jon Gottlieb said he got a call from Warwick police late Sunday morning, alerting him to the vandalism.

Though the outer wall can be easily breached, the vandals did not damage any of the headstones.

Directly across from the graveyard on Spanktown Road lies St. Joseph’s Cemetery, belonging to the Catholic congregation in Florida.

That cemetery, which has no walls surrounding it, was untouched.

“Obviously, someone came with premeditated intentions,” Gottlieb said. “This was very well thought out.”

Rabbi Rebecca Shinder, who has led the congregation for 11 years, said the desecration was “intensely personal.”

Cars driving past the defaced cemetery slowed to read the graffiti, expressing shock at what they saw.

Suzanne Greenhill of the Village of Florida stopped her SUV, with her two daughters inside, to offer words of support to temple members gathered there.

“That’s awful,” Greenhill said. “It baffles my mind.”

Warwick police are investigating the crime, but police officials could not be reached for comment Sunday. The temple also reported the incident to state police in Monroe.

“This is not just about the swastikas and Nazi Germany, even though “Heil Hitler” was written on the stones,” Shinder said.

“It represents hatred and persecution of the Jewish people throughout the centuries. It’s a symbol of hatred and intimidation.”

Shinder stood before the desecrated wall, silently praying the mourner’s Kaddish, touching her prayer book to her lips as she finished.

“I promise you, Kol Nidre will not be the same this year,” she said, referring to the holy recitation of “All Vows” on the eve of Yom Kippur, which comes Tuesday night.

Asked if she thought the vandalism was the work of kids, she said, “I don’t know if it is or it isn’t. Which is worse? I don’t know. But neo-Nazism is, unfortunately, alive and well in Europe and here.”

Geerd Mattheus, who co-chairs the cemetery committee, pulled up to the gate with his wife, Marcia, a member of the temple’s board of directors.

Marcia Mattheus burst into tears as she looked at the defaced wall. “My heart is broken,” she said.

The wall was already in need of repair, and removing the graffiti will be a painstaking process, said Michael Melasky, co-chair of the cemetery committee. But, he said, building a bigger wall is not an option.

“It’s a boundary, not a barrier,” Melasky said. “There is no security, and no need for security.”